Mega Comics CheckList

– Dave Davison is the subject of Project: New Man, a partly secret joint venture of the U.S. Government and the Fortress Foundation, a private sector non-profit philanthropic organization dedicated to public defense and scientific research. Dave has the dual role of being part of the research project and at the same time being groomed by the Government as a public protector in the Five Lakes Megalopolis area. Dave has a dark past which he hoped was dead and buried but in his first public adventure he confronts his past and an old partner head on in “The Mall Massacres”. Legacy Comics 1991 Black and White 32 page Independent Comic: Project: New Man #1is FREE to read in this very Web Browser!

– His actual identity is as much a mystery as what drives him. He calls himself Ebenezer Baal, and he is The Haunted Man but he intends for misery to have company as he in turn haunts Dave Davison a.k.a New Man. We find out in this origin tale Dave was not always a hero, and it seems his past is easily as shady as the criminals he now pursues! Co-Starring The Thunder Hawks! The backup story from Legacy Comics 1991 Black and White 64 page Independent Comic: Humants #1! FREE to read in this very Web Browser!

– Dave Davison A.K.A New Man goes out for a morning jog only to return to the Moriah Building under a full scale attack from Cyber-Tech! Also featuring Bearcat, and the Thunder Hawks! Featuring lots of never before published material! 32 action packed pages FREE to read in this very Web Browser!

– We tie up a lot of loose ends in this issue as The Haunted Man concludes. We find out the true identity of Ebeneezer Baal, see Bearcat in action again, see the abduction of Fawn and Nick, Cyber-Tech escapes plus a special secret surprise guest-star! Yeah! This one has it all!Featuring lots of never before published and some ALL-NEW material! 32 action packed pages FREE to read in this very Web Browser!

– High crime rates, higher gas prices, inflation and garbage strikes, are one thing but the recent unnatural storms have the residents Five Lakes Megalopolis rattled. Then the appearance of unusual individuals wielding supernatural powers precede the coming of a walking, flying nightmare! His name is Megeddon, Dark Lord of the Hecati and his chief servant, the powerhouse called Devastax! Krystal McKliston is an investigative reporter looking into these mysteries as she learns there are “Humants Among Us!”The lead story from Legacy Comics 1991 Black and White 64 page Independent Comic: Humants #1! FREE to read in this very Web Browser!

– The Herald, Magistar, and Man Ark must enter into deadly battle with Megeddon, the Dark Lord of the Hecati and his chief servant, the powerhouse called Devastax! Their goal: no less than total world destruction! Krystal McCliston, investigative reporter, tries to capture the action on video while dodging falling debris. She later comfronts a new villain: The Tower! Janeta Rosebud meets Omni Spawn and things will never again be the same! The lead story from Legacy Comics 1992 Black and White 48 page Independent Comic: Humants #2! FREE to read in this very Web Browser!

– Omnispawn ushers in yet another Humant: The Savage Chaosta! Also having survived their first encounter with the evil Dark Lord Mageddon, the Khosmotic Warriors have banded together and rented an old warehouse to use as a headquarters and training facility. Featuring lots of never before published material! 32 action packed pages FREE to read in this very Web Browser!

– This issue features the all out war between the Humants and the Renegade Humants! It's action from cover to cover as Freazie White, Jr. writes and does finished pencils over Mark Poe's layouts and we introduce a new inker, Paul Schulze! Featuring lots of never before published material! 32 action packed pages FREE to read in this very Web Browser!

– What happens when you try to administer first aid to an unconscious Humant? Well, in the case of Chaosta things could get pretty scary when she wakes up and thinks she is still battling the Renegade Humants! Man Ark and Sojourner find a lot of trouble for their efforts! Plus: Much More by Freazie White, Jr. new inker, Anthony Grayand Billy Leavell with Letters and Edits! PLUS: An offbeat Bearcat backup tale! By Mark Poe, Freazie White, Jr., Mark Alan Lester and Billy Leavell! Featuring lots of never before published material! 32 action packed pages FREE to read in this very Web Browser!

– Tess is a young lady who is a living tesseract. She comes from another dimension and in our dimension she can teleport herself or just about anything else just about any where. She manifests the power in a number of ways other than teleportation and she has a cute little 4th dimensional dog with a very high I.Q. named Nostradamus. In short: we are 3D beings, Tess and Nostradamus are 4D beings.Plus: Much More by Greg Legat writer/creator, Mark Poe with pencils, letters and colors! and J. Adam Walters handling inking embellishment. Featuring never before published material! 32 action packed pages FREE to read in this very Web Browser!

Watch for more coming soon!

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The tale we call The Haunted Man began late one night in Project: New Man #1. While on patrol in the city of New Harbour, New Man overheard the aimless braggadocio conversation of congregated street hoods. The name Ebenezer Baal had been at the center of the conversation. It was an alias of one incredibly elusive crime lord, whose true identity remained a mystery.

New Man made his way to the warehouse and was met by an ambush. Better than a dozen heavily armed men had found New Man’s Unified Field to be more than a match for their armament, alas, Baal himself had managed to escape.

A young costumed adventurer called Bearcat arriving on the scene, spots Baal’s timely exit and follows Baal to his hideout. Being somewhat new to the heroing business, the ofttimes presumptuous Bearcat soon finds himself face to face with Cyber-Tech, a cybernetic lackey of Baal’s. Cyber-Tech holds a grudge against the Thunderhawks (New Man’s trainers) and is intent on their destruction. No one, not even Bearcat or New Man, will stand in the way of the cyborg’s goals!

Project: New Man is a partly secret joint venture of the U.S. Government and the Fortress Foundation, a private sector, non-profit, philanthropic organization dedicated to public defense and scientific research. Dave has the dual role of being part of the research project and at the same time being groomed by the Government as a public protector in the Five Lakes Megalopolis area of New Harbour.

The Humants,The Herald, Magistar, and Man Ark are introduced to and must enter into deadly battle with Megeddon, the Dark Lord of the Hecati and his chief servant, the powerhouse called Devastax! Their goal: no less than total world destruction!The Herald is intent on stopping them as he administers the judgment called The Experience which he recently found out from Omni Spawn is his destiny to perform. Mageddon, is not very cooperative!

Krystal McCliston, investigative reporter for the TV show A Cyrstal View, tries to capture the action on video while dodging falling debris. This, it turns out, is good practice in survival when she later comfronts a new villain: The Tower!

Introducing also in this issue Janeta Rosebud of Rosebud Diversified Financial who will soon meet Omni Spawn and things will never again be the same!

The Humants are by no means mutants by another name. The series, is about a loose-knit band of characters from diverse walks of life who have been summoned to partake of an incredible power called Khosmotic. This enigmatic force re-creates its chosen, not mutates, and gradually conforms them into its own image. Thus it’s chosen become Khosmotic Warriors. They are the appointed of the Khosmotic Conjunction. The team’s base of operations is in the in the Five Lakes Megalopolis area and more specifically Municipal City.

Sorry for the delayed updates. I had some issues with my Hughes Net Router this morning after logging on to the web. I’ve worked on Macs and PC’s for 20 years, used this router for 5, built websites, troubleshooted all kinds of computer, printer and network problems for myself and clients but I’ve never seen any thing like this before. I could get any web site except my own. I rebooted the Router and everything was fine. Strange. Then I had some thick cloud cover blocking my satellite reception. Geeze! If it’s not one thing… 🙁

Here’s my favorite panel from today’s Humants # 2 update. The Herald confronts Mageddon for the second time! As you can see he’s more than a little ticked off that this has to be the second encounter after his botched first attempt to subdue the Dark Lord of the Hecati!

On the lighter side over in Project: New Man # 3, Dave is fulfilling a special request with two young fellows he met while doing his morning jog through the New Harbour Central Park. I always loved the scenes where Stan Lee and Jack Kirby had The Thing of the Fantastic Four entertaining some kids on one of his leisure outings in New York, which was what inspired this little exchange.

What a day I had Saturday! Everything seemed to be about 6 degrees off center.First there was the Hughes Net Router problems, then the thick clouds blocking my satellite reception. So I finally got everything updated on the sites and had to rush out to finish mowing the yard which I started Friday afternoon. Actually 3 yards, ours, the vacant house next door, and my wife’s Grandmother’s old yard. She passed on a few weeks ago. All these are in our extended family out in the country where we live, so it’s up to my Father-in-law and I to keep them up. Unfortunately he has had to work overtime all week covering for someone on vacation. My oldest son use to help out but he’s off at college now. My younger son is not yet old enough to do much mowing, but he’s learning. I’ve got the mowing down to a tight routine and usually it’s not hard at all and goes off on schedule, about a 4 hour job tops, but not the past two weeks. All the rain we’ve had from the storms in the Gulf has the grass growing like crazy! Then of course I ran out of gas and had to go pawn the TV to buy 5 gallons. 😉 Just kidding about pawning the TV, but to fill my 5 gallon can it cost $21.00! I wasn’t that long ago that it only cost me 6 or 7 bucks! So after wasting an hour getting gas I got back and got the mowing done, all except the trimming around the edges. 6 hours mowing! Geeze! 🙁

Today, I have a couple small outside jobs to do but for the most part, I work on web sites! 🙂

Above is a nice panel from today’s Humants # 2 update. The Herald and Man Ark converse on plans for the Humants to pool their resources as a team. The best lines of the script actually are in the last panel but I didn’t want to show that here and ruin the joke.

In Project: New Man # 3, New Man leaps into action, literally. A cool shot of the Moriah Building. This building was inspired by an actual skyscrapper in Birmingham, Alabama. I almost got arrested getting reference photos for this. Those guys in the Bellsouth Building were pretty ticked off that I got all the way up to the top floor without a security pass! It’s amazing what you can do when you put your mind to it and watch for opportnities. 🙂

I just made inventory of our original artwork Sunday. Here’s what we have left from our stock of stories and art:

Project: New Man #3: We are on page 18 of this 32 page issue.

Project: New Man #4: We have pages 1-8 to start this issue. We will have 23 more NEW story pages plus the covers. These pages will conclude The Haunted Man story line originally plotted 16 years ago! It will feature the story by Freazie White, Jr. and myself with art by me, Mark Poe.

This will wrap up the New Man stories unless there is demand for more or we have an idea for a new story that will fit the New Man mythos. It also gives us 128 pages if we want to do a Project: New ManTrade Paperback of these stories. So we are not closing any doors here, all options are open and on the table.

Now for the Humant’s report.

Humants # 2: We on page 28 of 32 pages so we’re about to wrap this one up.

Humants # 3: We have everything we need here for 32 pages plus covers inside and out. All I have to do is a little production work.

Humants # 4: We have everything we need here for 32 pages plus covers inside and out. All I have to do is a little production work.

Humants # 5: We have 20 pages of story on this one. We need 12 more NEW pages plus the back cover.

Humants # 6: We may need to do some NEW page for this issue to tie up loose ends.

With that we will wrap up the Humants stories unless you demand more or we have an idea for a new Humants story. The total page count for the Humants title will be about 198 pages which will make for a great HumantsTrade Paperback! So, again, we are not closing any doors here, all options are open and on the table.

All totaled, with our previous issues already in our web archives, this will give us over 300 pages of Legacy Comics online! That’s not counting a back-up features like Bearcat. Nor does it take tally of most of the pin-up art we’ve included in this blog! Neither does it count any of our Small Press work. That doesn’t include the work from Dimension Graphics we posted about the other day. With all that we’ll be over 400 pages on this site.WOW! I really did not realize we had done so much comic book related art!

After all this we will begin our new titles starting with Mega Tales.

A couple of great panels from today’s Humants # 2 update. Here’s a good example of why a young lady should never take a shortcut through a dark ally. Fortunately for Janeta Rodebud, Omnispawn is one of the good guys! 😉

In Project: New Man # 3, So who or what does New Man see as he makes his way through the smoke and debris of the Moriah Building. I’ll give you some clues: it’s shiny, big and mean! Ah, heck, just click the image and head on over to Project: New Man and find out!

In Humants # 2 we started something we wanted to be a regular feature. It was the Legacy Communications Page which naturally was inspired by those Stan LeeBullpen Bulletins of the 60’s and 70’s. We patterned a lot of the layout and the overall tone after several of the better Bullpen Bulletins we found going through our collection. We had a great time doing it and everyone at the conventions who came up to our tables seemed to get a reall kick out of it. Freazie and I had a great time putting it all together!

A new chapter begins today in Project: New Man # 3. Cyber-Tech isn’t gunning for New Man. No, he’s got a beef with the Thunder Hawks. In this chapter we see a little character development of Jonathan Thunderstorm, Thomas JeffryMcBride, and Percival Patton Parker. Christopher Torres makes his penciling debut!

When Freazie and I had the idea to put this web site together we really did not recall at the time just how much work we had amassed with Legacy Comics. Not to mention all the other comics work we had done. We thought we would put up the 3 issues we had published previously and move one. But we realized the stories in those early books were not concluded, so it seemed only fair to put out the unpublished issues as well, if we could find them! We look at this as the foundation for what’s to come. We may push back the release of our new title: Mega Tales a week or two to tie up some loose ends on the Humants and Project: New Man titles that were not taken care of before. But it’s all coming, so bear with us and we’ll get it all online for you.

I had a freak accident yesterday, unfortunately gaining super-powers was not the end result. 😉 Somehow while taking out the garbage, I pushed the bag down into the can which really already had too much in it. When I did, something punctured the bag and sliced my left thumb. I thought it may have been some broken glass, but my wife could not recall any glass in the garbage. So maybe it was the lid from one of the dog food cans. I don’t know but I got a deep cut out of it, probably enough to require some stitches. It was difficult to get it to stop bleeding. But I’ve got some of those Bandaids that pull a wound together so I should be fine. Even though it’s my left hand, and I’m right handed, I’m finding I have trouble typing and doing a lot of things that I normally do. It feels better today and hasn’t bled again since last night. So the moral of this story is, be careful with garbage. It’s more dangerous than you might think! 😉

In Humants # 2 shows page 2 of the Legacy Communications Page with an ad for Humants # 3 showing the original cover. After solicited orders from the distributors were low, I started looking around at other books on sale at the time and thought maybe if we changed the cover and the logo it might stand out a bit better. Didn’t help that much. The orders were not much higher when we resolicited. You will see the original cover in Issue #3.

Project: New Man # 3. Cyber-Tech comes face to face with the Thunder Hawks. We showcase the talents of Christopher Torres who penciled this and the next chapter. Chris did an awesome job and we would have asked him to do a lot more penciling had Legacy Continued. If memory serves me he might have also done some backgrounds on Humants # 3 or 4. Can’t remember which.

Not your ordinary Web Comic! 😀 Charley Parker is considered one of webcomics founding fathers. His strip Argon Zark located at zark.com has been online since 1995 and is the first long form comic ever available on the web! Argon Zark is also unique in it’s content. Although it started out a some what simple yet elegant daily strip it soon evolved into a lush work of art with each strip having easter eggs, links and animated effects. In his own words Mr. Parker sums up his vision for the strip: “I started Argon Zark! with the intention of simply having fun doing a comic story the way I wanted, with no art directors, editors, or publishers telling me what I could or couldn’t do.” Certainly Mr. Parker has accomplished that and more.

Argon Zark is the name of the main character who is a computer geek. The first we see of him is in the opening scene of the first strip from book one. In his house which may be in a neighborhood or out in the country, that’s not clear, Argon is surrounded by computer monitors and wires running everywhere. Behind him is his sidekick robot, Cybert! Cybert is a bit challenged in his speech recognition program which adds lots of humor to the strip. Argon has perfected PTP, Personal Transport Protocol which enables him to transport himself, Cybert and an unexpected guest, Zeta, the Fed Ex/UPS type delivery person through the internet and on an offbeat, madcap adventure! If you have never read Argon Zark start with the first page of book one and let the fun begin! Be warned! It’s hard to stop once you start and the first book is 50 pages long. So if your reading this at work, you might want to wait to start reading book one until you get home. 🙂

Book 2 has been in the making for the past 10 years and currently on page 27 or there about. As quoted above Mr. Parker does things his own way and does not want the pressure of constant deadlines. As the strip evolved each page became a work of fine and technological art. So doing the strip on a daily basis would not be possible now. In addition Mr. Parker has had to work full time doing other work at his own web design studio to pay the bills, so Argon Zark is more or less his hobby. He also teaches a class in Web Design at Delaware College of Art And Design.

Charley Parker writes he was “extremely fortunate and grateful recipient of a kidney transplant (10 years as of last September!). I’d like to urge anyone who hasn’t thought about organ donation to read a little bit about it and consider what a remarkably simple and wonderful thing it is to list yourself as an organ donor. For a good source of information, here is a site I designed for the Gift of Life Donor Program.“ So if not for someone thoughtful enough to sign up to be an Organ Donor we might not have Mr. Parker or Argon with us today! Something to think about.

The calm of a starry night. It transcends our earthly bounds and gently tugs at our inner desires to rise above and touch our Creator. It has so inspired poets, songwriters and artists for ages untold. Yet on this starry, silent night it is not the gentle heart of an artist it touches, but that of the Adjudicator of the Khosmotic himself! Who would even dare imagine the Herald knowing a moment of peace and reflection.

Then dropping like an angel from the heavens Magistar shows up. The Herald indeed shows there is far more to him than the grim avenger we have seen in his mission quest to render Khosmotic Judgment on the Dark Lord of the Hecati, Mageddon.

In the midst of this calm meeting between the two Humants, the Herald brings up a profound, yet simple question regarding the Renegade Humants and their fate. Tomorrow we’ll learn the answer.

The end is near! 😉 That’s right, web wayfarer, Mega Comics Group is almost done! No, we’re not calling it quits, but Phase 1 of our grand adventure into where no Mega Maniac has gone before is almost over.

What is phase one? Glad you asked! Phase 1 of our mission has been to publish our previous work from the 1980’s and 1990’s some of which first saw print as black and white independent comics which were available nationwide in comic specialty shops. So far we have put up the Legacy Comics body of work we did in the early ’90’s. We’ve got 9 issues of 32 pages each on the respective web sites of Project: New Man and the Humants. Actually we are posting the 9th issue now. When we finish posting Humants # 5 we will have 288 pages of comics up on our web server. That does not include all the other art we’ve posted like sketches, promos, concept drawings, etc. which have accompanied the MCG Daily Blog right here on this site. We’ve published 157 blogs here. That’s not a bad offering for 6 months work, eh?

Phase 2 is coming in full color! Yes, even though our critics might wish we would stop there and just fade away we just can’t oblige them. We ain’t getting any younger ya know! There is still a lot to do. First we have to finish Phase 1 with the Dimension Graphics body of work which will be in the forthcoming Mega Tales title. Tess by Greg Legat and Mark Poe are one of those tales which we’ll be doing in full 21st century color. A little of the old will be mixed with the new.

Then we will begin to publish the new concepts we’ve had in mind and been talking about for some time now. Currently on the drawing board are also new versions of Project: New Man and the Humants. In addition to those we have Miracle Comics, the Mega Mascots and The Quantum Mechanics still in the planning stages. We’ll clue you in more on these as we go. Yes, things will be mighty fine in 2009! We hope you will come along with us!

Now let’s check in on that 5th issue of Legacy Comics’ Humants!

Humants # 5:

Chaosta as you recall from Humants #2 is from the wealthy, and socially prominent Rosebud family. She has always been well taken care of as far as not lacking for any material thing she wanted. But the feelings of family love and camaraderie was never there for her. She is feeling like she belongs with this ragtag band of misfits heroes.

Scamp is also feeling like he belongs. Having lived a lot on the street, working what jobs he could secure, taking advantage of any opportunity that came along legal or not, and scamming as much as he could get away with to make a buck, always kept him on the run. Now he feels like he can relax in a real, secure job, and not have to always look over his shoulder. Of course if a super baddie blows up the warehouse tomorrow, he might be back on the streets or worse…but he doesn’t like to think that far ahead. 😉

As you can see Freazie has done some character development with this issue. He and Anthony have done a great job. Billy has done pretty good too! 😉

Can you believe it? Here we are just a week away from Thanksgiving here in the good ol’ US of A! The year has just flown by and 2011 is just around the corner!

More Kirby Treats!

As promised in last Friday’s blog… This week we’re taking a peek at some more, never before published on thes digital pages Jack Kirby art which Mark Poe, our esteemed Publisher-In-Training and aspiring inker has done in the not so distant past…

What can I say about Jack Kirby that has not already been said? Well, probably not a whole heck of a lot! There have been books, interviews, magazines, songs, video tributes and just about everything imaginable said about the late, great Mr. Kirby! Certainly everyone reading this and certainly everyone who has collected comics for any length of time knows who he was and what he has done.As I wrote before Jack Kirby inspired an industry! That’s not to say, as some critics would try to infer, I’m saying that Jack created the industry single handed. He had a lot of capable and talented help! 😉 All kidding aside, almost every seasoned professional I’ve ever read after, even guys like Will Eisner and Wally Wood, who both had more than a little impact on comics history themselves, credit Kirby with being one of a very few who inspired the industry to greater heights consistently. He was one of the Founding Fathers, along with the other two I just mentioned, for the Comic Book Industry.Even though the styles differed the impact they all made was no lesssignificant. ’nuff said! 😉

So with all that in mind, let’s check out the art! The first piece I’ve showcased on this page is one of the best pages from one of the best issues of Jack’s original New God’s series; #6 The Glory Boat. This piece is lifted straight out of the book with great inks by Mike Royer.Mr. Royer has often been credited as being Kirby’s most faithful inker. That is to say, he inked Kirby’s pencils as close to the original sketch as possible, more so than any other inker. I put this one here, not because I did anything on it, other than scan it, but for reference and just ’cause I like it a lot! Besides it looks better to lead off the blog with a nice color image! 😉

Next up is a great pic of Orion, one of my favorite Kirby characters of the ’70’s era. This particular drawing is a recreation of one of Kirby’s original model sheets which became part of the cover for New Gods #1. If I’m not mistaken this particular image was a fan commission. I don’t have the copy of the pencils right now but I’m including the inked drawing. These are my inks over a photo copy of Kirby’s pencils. Click on the drawing to see a larger view.

Big Barda was also one of the New Gods… Jack Kirby’s women were liberated before there was any national movement for the cause! Barda is no doubt one of Kirby’s strongest female characters, no pun intended. 😉 This sketch is likely from another fan commission.With this as with all the inkings I have presented here, I tried to stay as faithful to the sketch as I possibly could. Click on the drawings to see a larger view.

Mr. Miracle was another great ’70’s character from King Kirby! The Super Escape Artist! What a concept! Jack could come up with the best twists on old concepts! So instead of another Super Hero he gave us a Super Entertainer, more or less. Scott Free had one of the best back stories in the business and his costume was perfect for the character. This is another sketched fan commission I’m sure.

So why did I do these inkings? Well, the latter two I think may have been for a contest. I don’t remember if I ever actually entered it. These were done 2 or 3 years ago. The Orion sketch I just wanted to ink! That’s the biggest reason for doing any of it, just for the fun of inking it. But also, I found out long ago it helps me to be a better artist when I ink another artist’s work. There are things that I often don’t see just looking at the art until I ink it. I get a new perspective and appreciation for the artist as I put ink to their pencil lines.

I have more Kirby Inkings… But I will save those for another post.

Any questions or comments? All are welcome.

Enjoy the weekend!

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Archives Spotlight

We continue our look back at our previously posted web comics. We’ll be looking at all that’s come before with this feature and adding new comments as well. This month we are reviewing Project: New Man #2 and Humants #1! Stay tuned to this section everyFriday for more of our archived titles.

Project: New Man #2 – Page 10 – Some great shots ofNew Harbour City which is part of the Five Lakes Megalopolis, in which the Humants are running around in as well, at this same time. We were trying to tie the Project: New Man and Humants cast together and if you are reading close you have already picked that up in a few places.

Shhh… Be very quiet. Looks like Dave is nodding off. Poor guy is probably all tuckered out after what he’s just been through. If this were on TV we’d see the screen get all fuzzy as our star fades off into a dream… But that will have to wait until Chapter 2!

Mark’s Remarks:The Moriah Building was inspired greatly, at least in concept, by the Baxter Building and the sky scrapper headquarters of Doc Savage and his Amazing Five which, even though it was never named in the stories, was inferred to be the Empire State Building. The idea of the heroes headquarters being an office building was always fascinating to me. So I had to use it for the Thunder Hawks, andNew Man.

Later in the Humantstitle Freazie White, Jr. unveils another interesting concept for a headquarters. I don’t think he meant to, because he was never much of a Doc Savage fan, but Freazie used Doc’s other headquarters… that of an old renovated warehouse.

If you like Doc Savage or never heard of him but would like to hear and see more, check out DC Comics new Doc Savage series.

Humants #1 – Page 9 – Some cool introduction shots of Magistar.The Five Lakes Megalopolis was Freazie’s tribute to the Detroit Michigan area with all it’s sprawling suburbs.

Mark’s Remarks:Using the cityscape as a backdrop in somewhat the style of those ’60’s and ’70’s Marvelbooks,Freazie wanted to portray a scene somewhat like Stan Lee,Steve Ditko and John Romita often did with Spider-man. Spidey was always hanging out on the rooftops of New York mulling over his life events usually talking to himself in the process trying to make sense of it all. So then we find Magistar doing a similar thing here, going over in his mind the sequence of incidents leading up to his current situation. Freazie decided to narrate the characters musings rather than using word or thought balloons to supply the supposition. As an avid reader of comics himself, no doubt Freazie was thinking that was more in line with the comics of the dark and gritty ’90’s. Personally I liked it, but I often wonder if comic book writers of the day as well as today may take the seriousness tone a bit too far. Freazie would often try to strike a balance and add in humor every chance he got particularly with characters like Man-Ark and The Herald, who we’re about to meet. They played well against the angst Magistar often portrayed.

We hope everyone in the U.S. is enjoying the Thanksgiving Holiday! We’re thrilled to be entering into another Holiday Season. We’ve got a special video courtesy of our friends at YouTube. To fit in with our theme of the past few weeks we present more work by Jack Kirby as recognized at the 2010 Fumetto International Comic Festival which was hosted in Lucerne, Switzerland earlier this year. Over 150 pieces of his comic book art was on display on 3 floors. The exhibit spans his life’s work from 1940s until the 1990s with art and photos. Enjoy!

The Universe That Jack Built

Jack Kirby has been given the nickname “King of Comics”. He has contributed to the super hero comic like no other and influenced up-and-coming artists in both the alternative and main stream scenes. Fumetto will proudly present an in-depth display of his work for the very first time at a European festival. His less known pieces from earlier days will also be shown together with his joint-project with Stan Lee including the complete Marvel Universe and the super hero comic in general of which they both have heavily influenced. A chance of a lifetime to be a part of the King’s audience, a chance that no comic fan should miss out on.

Archives Spotlight

We continue our look back at our previously posted web comics. We’ll be looking at all that’s come before with this feature and adding new comments as well. This month we are reviewing Project: New Man #2 and Humants #1! Stay tuned to this section everyFriday for more of our archived titles.

Project: New Man #2 – Page 11 – Now we start with The Haunted Man Chapter 2:The Dream Sequence. A clever little, time honored devise we employed to tell New Man’s origin tale. We start out in Prison! The art is dark and moody and as the pages unfold we see a progression of lightening up in the pages to follow. Meet David “Killer” Kane who would one day becomes New Man! Yep! That’s him in his jail cell!

Mark’s Remarks:I can only think of one. That is, one other hero who was a convict before he was a hero. Luke Cage, formerly called Power Man is whom I speak of. So I think it’s safe to say New Man is one of the few, and possibly only one of two. I thought this was important to the character. I wanted to show a guy who was guilty as sin, who should by all rights live and die as a villain, but who turns completely around to become a hero. It’s the concept of the second chance.

Freazie White, Jr. does a convincing job with the character development. I think the way he writes the script and gradually shows David “Killer” Kane begin to soften and change is realistic. Freazie also added another dimension, that of David being a victim as well as a villain. But I best not give away anymore we’re still on page 11!

Humants #1 – Page 10 – Omni Spawn meets with Magistar. Teacher meets with pupal. As the dialogue reveals Magistar’s training has been going for some time now. Also, as we’ll see in the next few pages, Omni Spawn has been busy training others as well.

Mark’s Remarks:Freazie’s influences in comics, where his art is concerned, range mostly from Jack Kirby though Paul Gulacy. Also he was inspired by just about everyone who drew comics for Marvel during the 60’s and 70’s when he was growing up. That Marvel flavor shows in his work. I shared that same level of saturation with Freazie as well, which explains the retro ’70’s look to a lot of what we do. Next page I will clue you in on where the inspiration for these wild panel layouts in Humants #1 came from.

It’s A Kirby Thing!

Another Kirby Sketch Inked! This one, Mark Poe, our esteemed Publisher-In-Training and resident inker, colorist and promoter of stuff, inked from a copy of Jack Kirby’s original pencil art for an inking contest several years ago. Mark attempted to pull off a combination of Joe Sinnott, Mike Royer and Frank Giacoia’s style of embellishment, three of Jack’s best inkers from back in the day. Mark must not have managed to impress the judges with his multiple homage work since he did not win. No, not even an honorable mention! 🙁 But we still love the guy’s work and as usual he had a great time doing the job! This sketch was done by Kirby in ’77, Mark inked it probably in ’96. Color was added yesterday. 🙂 Click both images to see a larger image in a new window and grade Mark on how he’s done!

Google’s Problem!

You may have noticed Google has Red Flagged part of our site. So why does Google think there is malware on our site? Google is highly secretive about their procedures, but we do know when they do their scans they don’t just scan our site but the IP address. Unless the web site is on a dedicated server, more web sites may also share an IP Address, as we do. We found two other sites on our IP which scan high risk positives for malware. Since we can’t find the alleged malware on our site that could be where the problem is. Rather than verify the individual web sites FIRST, when a suspicious bit of code sets off an alarm for an IP address, Google just slaps their signs up and goes on to let the owner of the flagged site work it out, if he can. How very considerate of them! To get the site off the Black List can be a process that takes weeks, by their own admission, in some cases. Google does not seem to have many humans monitoring the ‘bots in charge of flagging sites for malware risk. It appears Google has little concern for the damage they might do to a business, which may have been flagged without legitimate reason.

In addition to other sites on the same server causing neighboring clean sites problems, there are some site configurations which can cause what are called False Positives to show up on a malware scan. These are like ghost images on a radar caused by interference from nearby objects which are not the actual target of the radar.

Let me say up front right now, we have used several independent scans from various malware detecting software web resources BUT HAVE NOT FOUND ANY MALWARE ON ANY OF OUR PAGES! Regardless of their PR, it may well be that Google’s scanning is no better than any other. This was the 4th time they have done this in 6 months. We have hired a company, SiteSecurityMonitor.com, that specializes in monitoring and cleaning web sites to track down any problem and fix it. So far they have only found minor, potential problems, but no malware. I’ll keep you updated on what we find out.

Don’t get me wrong… I appreciate the fact Google is trying to help prevent potentially millions of users from having their computers infected with some strange electronic virus or redirecting to a site they would not want to see. We live in an age where the web pages now load almost as fast as changing the channel on the TV, so to advert a disaster Google believes they have to move fast. No problem with that either, but there are ways disaster can be averted and saving millions of folks a lot of trouble WITHOUT, at the same time, killing the victim! A haphazard or over reactive policy on malware detection can and has ruined more than one business! Not all search engines have such proactive procedures in place.

Malware and hackers are a problem which is growing and has become more common in the past few years. Hackers are more clever than ever. However, if a company like Google doesn’t adapt better polices in dealing with these issues in a more effective and discrete way, it is they who will suffer in the long run. The business public may begin to look at them with the same disdain they have for the hackers.

Google has only been around a little over 10 years. They were nothing when they started and took on the established search engines of the day. They rose fast and appeared to be an overnight success. The reason for their success was they gave people something they wanted and needed. If Google doesn’t get back to the practices that made them a success there will be another company to rise up and take their place just as they did the search engine companies before them. Does anyone remember Magellan, Excite, Infoseek, Inktomi, Northern Light, and AltaVista? Some are still around but have a very small share of the Search Engine market. Will Google join them in obscurity when the better company comes along? It’s happened before…

Any questions or comments? All are welcome.

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Archives Spotlight

We continue our look back at our previously posted web comics. We’ll be looking at all that’s come before with this feature and adding new comments as well. This month we are reviewing Project: New Man #2 and Humants #1! Stay tuned to this section everyFriday for more of our archived titles.

Project: New Man #2 – Page 12 – Interesting conversation here. Pay close attention, dear reader, this mysterious figure not only plays a key role in the unfolding saga of the Legacy Universe but also he was key in those old Small Press books we did under the Magi Graphics Banner. Now there’s a clue for you super slueths!

Mark’s Remarks:I don’t like the way the art ended up looking here. We had too many hands involved in the process when it was all said and done.

Freazie White, Jr. continues to do a good job with the character development. This page and the next one lays out a subplot which would span several issues before the mystery would be solved as to who was really behind Project: New Man. We did not come back to this in the 4 issues of Project: New Man but did see this character again in Humants #5 and added to the deepening sub-plot. Someday we’ll resolve it… if Freazie and I can remember where we were going with it! 😉

Humants #1 – Page 11 – Omni Spawn seems to get around! And he doesn’t seem to need to use the conventional methods Magistar uses… if leaping 5 stories to the top of another building can be called “conventional.” 😉

Mark’s Remarks:Okay, at long last I can reveal the age old secret of those wild panel layouts in the pages of Humants # 1. Freazie and I were doing Small Press books before we ventured into the Independent Market. The original art board size is just a little longer for regular comic book size than for Small Press. Freazie had started penciling part of the Humants first book for Small Press before Project: New Man. When we decided to go to the Independent Market with issue 1 of Project: New Man we began to make similar plans for the Humants book. So Freazie switched over, after we remembered to do so, to the larger comic boards. He shuffled the pages about a bit and the new pages ended up at the beginning of Humants # 1. So when I got all the pages to prepare for the printers, I had to cut the Small Press size pages and panels apart and paste them on Regulation Comic Boards so all the sizes matched. In doing so, I had to come up with some interesting ways to fill the space without it looking like we were correcting a mistake. Allan Lewis was a tremendous help with this! We borrowed an idea or two from Todd McFarlane and that’s The Rest of the Story as Paul Harvey would say! Whew! Just remembering all that was hard work! 😉

Christmas Gifts For The Kirby Fan!

Since we’ve been showing off mostly Kirby art lately, we figured folks might like to know how to get more on Jack and his art! There are a number of books out now on Jack Kirby detailing his life as well as his career and his stunning art which is the one of the primary foundation stones of the comics industry. We’ve hooked up with Amazon.com to showcase some of our favorites.

We Fired Google!

We put up with the nonsense for over a week, and that’s all she wrote! I can be very patient but enough is enough! After numerous scans of our web site, by myself, using numerous web site scanning resources, as well as those of the company we hired to help, SiteSecurityMonitor.com, who specializes in monitoring and cleaning web sites, nothing which could be called malware, was found! The only thing that came close was from a Norton Safe Web scan which showed a suspicious link they refer to as a Drive-By Download. According to Norton, “A Drive-by Download is computer code that takes advantage of a software bug in a Web browser to make it do something that the attacker wants—such as run malicious code, crash the browser, or read data from the computer. Software bugs that are open to browser attacks are also known as vulnerabilities.” The thing is, even though Norton had one link on our entire web site flagged as suspicious, they said the flag was one of caution and did not rate a red flag or dangerous warning. Google seems to have the knee jerk policy of flag and block it first, then ask questions later.

After our Humants pages were on theGoogle Black List for over a week we signed up with Norton Safe Web and got them to review the page in question. Norton cleared it and then, lo and behold, Google cleared it. Interesting… I have to ask, Who was scanning who? Was Google really scanning our site for malware, as they claim, or we’re they scanning Norton for warnings and just flagging anything that comes up regardless of the degree of potential danger?

To hopefully avoid this situation again in the future, we’ve banned Googlebots from indexing our site! We have also asked them to remove our site content and links from Google search results. Google supplies Webmaster Tools to do all of this. So we still must maintain an account with them just to keep an eye on them! 😉 Plus we have Adsense accounts and Gmail accounts which we need to hold on to, at least for awhile, so we’ve not severed all ties… yet. But Googlebots are not welcome! Maybe someday Google will get back to doing business instead of trying to be the internet’s safety cops! But until they do… forget ’em!

“What?! Are you nuts?! How can you survive without Google search results?” Glad you asked. 😉 That is the first response of just about everyone, including myself, at the thoughts of losing Google ranking and search results. But the more I thought on it, and the more research I did through Google searches as well as, Bing, Yahoo, and some of the other search engines, I began to realize some things. Google is not as big as they were 5 years ago… It might be more accurate to say the web is a lot bigger than it was 5 years ago! What I’m talking about is, in the past 5 years a lot of things have happened which make Google not nearly as important as it was in 2005. Social Networks have exploded on the web scene, Web 2.0 has become the standard and the way web sites are ranked has changed dramatically. The web has evolved so much so that on October 15, 2009, one of Google’s own employees, Susan Moskwa, said PageRank, Google’s patented link analysis algorithm, was removed by the corporation from its Webmaster Tools, which are available free to all web masters just for signing up. She wrote, “We’ve been telling people for a long time that they shouldn’t focus on PageRank so much; many site owners seem to think it’s the most important metric for them to track, which is simply not true.”

So what happens if you search for Mega Comics Group on Google? Our name still shows up on Google BUT not our web site. Our other networked pages on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and others will still show up. Our web site still shows up on Bing, Yahoo, Ask and just about any other search engine you might care to use. Those results are going to increase in the weeks and months to come. So who needs Google? We don’t. 🙂

Any questions or comments? All are welcome.

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Archives Spotlight

We continue our look back at our previously posted web comics. We’ll be looking at all that’s come before with this feature and adding new comments as well. This month we are reviewing Project: New Man #2 and Humants #1! Stay tuned to this section everyFriday for more of our archived titles.

Project: New Man #2 – Page 13 – More Interesting conversation. Ah, the stage is set, now to bring in our star… on the next page. See ya then, web wayfarer! 😉

Mark’s Remarks:My penciling could have been better here. I didn’t do a good job placing the shadows to enhance the mood of the scene. The characters are stiff and not proportioned well. The art was rushed and it shows. The inking was a little heavy handed too. Both improve as we get farther into the story.

I liked the dialog between the Warden and the mysterious benefactor. Freazie White, Jr. really had some nice lines for the characters here. Good interchange. One of my favorites is from the mystery man in panel two. “Why that should be obvious, Warden….Only a dead man could possibly accept the terms of the contract connected to Project New Man.” ’nuff said!

Humants #1 – Page 12 – Now let’s meet the rest of the team:Man Ark, Sojourner, and… uh… well, we have to wait until the next page to find out the next Humant!

Mark’s Remarks:Maybe I am bias, but I like these pages. I thought these were some of Freazie and Al’s best work on Humants # 1. Of course there are always areas which could have been improved. That is always going to be the case with anything. So constructive criticism is always welcome and very much encouraged. It’s one of the best tools we have for learning in this business and fan feedback is the most valuable resource.

Fan feedback was not always around in the comics industry for the most part. It was really a by-product of the Silver/Marvel Age of Comics. Comic books had letter columns before the ’60’s only in a few books. It was in the 1960’s when the letters to the editor really legitimatized comics fandom. Letter columns were a part of most comic books until recent years, when e-mail, forum pages, social network sites, and comment boxes on blog pages like we have here, more or less replaced them. Some comics still have LOC’s but they seem to be in the minority these days. I miss those, especially the ’60’s Marvel Comics Letters Pages. Stan Lee, Roy Thomas, and others, with great help from the fans, made the Marvel LOC’s almost as entertaining as the comic book stories they produced!

Happy Birthday Tribute to Dave Simons!

Dave’s 56th Birthday Is Monday, December 20th! As a tribute to Dave and his life work we dedicate this blog to his memory! Above is the original Dave Simons cover done for Marvel Comics What If? title. Below, to the left, you can see the tribute art Mark Poe, our esteemed Publisher-In-Training and number oneDave Simons fan did last year as his “Thank You!” to Dave for being a great inspiration to him and cartoonists everywhere, as well as a great friend. This art print is available in full vibrant color to anyone who donates $25.00 or more to the Dave Simons Inkwell Memorial Scholarship fund. OR, if you prefer, you can get the beautiful Blake Wilkie recreation seen below. Get full details at the Inkwell Awards web site here: www.inkwellawards.com/simons.html. And tell ’em we sent ya!

Great Googley-Moogly! It’s Dave Simons Birthday!

Remembering Dave on his birthday! It’s hard to believe Dave Simons has been gone for almost a year and 6 months. He past on after a battle with cancer back in June of 2009. But knowing Dave, he really wouldn’t want to talk about that. No, he would have wanted to talk about the things he really enjoyed in LIFE!

Dave was one of those one in a million personalities we rarely seem to see anymore. There are people who all of us have known who were bigger than life. People who have a flair and love for life and people, which is infectious. Dave inspired thousands with his art. Those who knew him personally will tell you he inspired them with his work ethic, his honesty and great sense of humor as well. He was the kind of person others like to be around in large part because it was obvious he liked being around them!

Growing up and learning how to do art I had several heroes in the business! We’ve shown off a lot of Jack Kirby’s art of late. Jack was one of my inspirations as well as Dave’s and practically everyone in the business today, of course! But even more so, Dave was a lot like Jack. They shared a lot of the same traits. Both were, of course, very creative. Both were very prolific in their work. Both went out of their way to help other artists in whatever way was needed whether it was a pep talk, some priceless , but free, art instruction or even help with a few bucks until payday! Both were very honest in who and what they were. Both Kirby and Simons thought of themselves as just the average guy who got some good breaks in life for which they were very grateful. They loved the comics fans and never came across as arrogant or better than the rest of us. Being around either of them was totally disarming. Kirby, I never had the privilege of meeting, but from all I’ve heard and read of those who knew him personally, I know he was just a regular Joe. When I met Dave I was a bit awestruck. Here I was talking to one of the guys whose work I followed from the time I was a young, aspiring artist. But Dave had a way of defusing that nervous tension when meeting the fans. I’ve heard others say the same thing. A few minutes around him and a person felt like he was just one of the guys. Dave didn’t think of himself as anyone important. But the ironic thing about people like that is, they are the most important! Happy birthday, Dave. 🙂

Much more about Dave Simons, his life, art and peoples lives he touched, can be found at his web site: www.dave-simons.com

Any questions or comments? All are welcome.

______________________________

Archives Spotlight

We continue our look back at our previously posted web comics. We’ll be looking at all that’s come before with this feature and adding new comments as well. This month we are reviewing Project: New Man #2 and Humants #1! Stay tuned to this section everyFriday for more of our archived titles.

David “Killer” Kane is a most unlikely subject to become a heroic figure. As we learn who he is and what he’s done we see he’s been anything but a hero. So who better to become a savior but one which whom has to be saved first! Is such a thing possible? Time will tell…

Mark’s Remarks:My penciling could have been better here. Sometimes a project get’s too many hands involved and it hurts it. Often times, however, too many hands makes it better! A good example of the later is Project: New Man #1. It was with that example in mind, which I’m sure bolstered my confidence, I proceeded with a similar plan but with different artists and different results.

It’s not bad art, it tells the story, but again, it could have been better. Freazie White, Jr’s great scripting saves it. Only another page or two like this.

Well, some of our heroes lacked the power of flight or fancy grappling hooks and ropes. The Herald makes his entrance to the roof top meeting site in his own way. But if I were you, I would not mention it to him! Heck! I might even consider moving to another state! 😉

Mark’s Remarks:Freazie put a lot of character development into his scripts. I mean look here… even just having been introduced, their radiant personalities just seem to bubble to the top! Right? Already we can tell Magistar is a timid leader, trying not to let on to the others how he is not as confident as he wants to sound. It’s clear with Soljourner that he was brought up to be a gentleman. His demeanor hints at a royal lineage. Man-Ark, is a big, fun loving type that enjoys a good belly laugh. Then there’s the Herald. He’s the gruff, no nonsense, fighter! The telling of his origin, later on, reveals that he was a homeless person whom Omnispawn found when issued The Call. He doesn’t remember his past of much of anything else except his mission. What’s The Call? Well, now… we’ll be getting to that soon as well, Stay tuned!

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all!

The Holiday Season is upon us! It’s hard to believe another year has come and gone but here we are at Christmas 2010! We here at MegaComicsGroup.com hope each and every person reading this blog has the best Holidays ever!

Who’s the guys in front of the Marvel Painting? The gentleman’s name is Allen Bellman. Mr. Bellman’s is one of the great cartoonists from the Golden Age of Comics and in particular Timely/Marvel Comics. From his web site:

Allen Bellman was born in Manhattan and studied at the High School of Industrial Arts. He eventually became a staff artist at Timely during the Golden Age of Comics. While still a teenager, he did the backgrounds for Syd Shores’ Captain America in 1942, and eventually worked on titles such as: The Patriot, The Destroyer, The Human Torch, Jap Buster Johnson and Jet Dixon of the Space Squadron, All Winners Comics, Marvel Mystery, Sub Mariner Comics, Young Allies and so much more.”

Mark Poe, our esteemed Publisher-In-Training and Black Friday Comics contest winner got an early Christmas gift in the form of an original pencil sketch from Mr. Bellman. Thanks to Michael D. Hamersky and Make It So Marketing, Mark won the Grand Prize on the Black Friday Comics event the day after Thanksgiving on Facebook. Mr. Bellman promised a “…a tight graphite pencil sketch, 9×12 of Cappy (Captain America), belting Hitler, or any other villain of that period. I will put all but the kitchen sink into it. This one could have a value of $195.” True to his word, he delivered at Mark’s request of “Cap punching out the Red Skull with Hitler in the background.” Click the image to the right for a larger viewing in a new window.

Find out all about Mr. Bellman and his commission sketches on his web site: www.AllenBellman.com, where you can contact him.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

I hope you get more than you asked for! 😉 I sure did! As you read above I am now the proud owner of a bit of Golden Age Treasure. I’d like to thank Allen Bellman for the great job he did. It turned out even better than I imagined and will have a reserved place of honor on my office wall as soon as the mailman delivers it. Also a big “Thank you!” to Michael D. Hamersky at Make It So Marketing for putting on Black Friday Comics and giving me the opportunity to enter for the Grand Prize.

Also on a related note of gratitude…. Thanks to each and every reader who have diligently and patiently followed this MCG blog since we started it back in 2008. This year, as has been reported, has not gone at all as planned and we’ve had a lot of distractions and delays on our publications along the way. But we’re still here and we’re making progress toward our goals. Most of that progress of late has been behind the scenes as we have been bringing to a close our old Art Service business in favor of expanding our Art Production business including our new comics publications. Hopefully, we’ll be able to give you a full report soon and get all our comics projects back to full production mode. So thanks for sticking with us and Happy Holidays!

Any questions or comments? All are welcome.

______________________________

Archives Spotlight

We continue our look back at our previously posted web comics. We’ll be looking at all that’s come before with this feature and adding new comments as well. This month we are reviewing Project: New Man #2 and Humants #1! Stay tuned to this section everyFriday for more of our archived titles.

Project: New Man #2 – Page 15 – An offer he could not refuse! What would you do? The guy is on death row, slated to die anyway. So here he has an opportunity to live, IF he can survive being a guinea pig!

Mark’s Remarks:My layouts are better on this page… but the proportions are a bit off. Of course I’ve seen other books with the same type of mistakes published by the big two in times past. The thing about production art where deadlines are always looming, the art is often rushed. It’s not as obvious these days especially with larger staffs and the use of PhotoShop and like programs which allow for much more editing and adjustments. Maybe someday I’ll go back and redo some or all these pages, who knows?

Humants #1 – Page 14 – And so the first meeting of The Humants team is done. A chapter ends and a new one begins… on the next post! Be here! …uh, that is, if you want to… and we sure hope you do! 😉

Mark’s Remarks: Freazie covers a lot of ground on this page setting up the story for the action to come. More than that, even though it’s basically talking heads, Mr. White manages to keep it interesting with his layout and art. Freazie has been criticized before concerning his use of shadows. Maybe he does get carried away some with his light sources but I recall other artists who used abstract shadow casting for dramatic effect. One of my favorite cartoonists is Jack Kirby, as you might have guessed by now. 😉 Kirby could get more use out of dramatic, abstract shadows than just about anyone I’ve ever studied. Yeah, sure, Freazie’s art may not be prefect, but whose is? He can tell a story with his pictures and perfect or not there has always been something about Freazie’s art which is appealing. Exactly what that bit of charm is I don’t know, but I like it! 🙂

Happy New Year!

2011 is here! Fresh off of the Christmas 2010 here we are with New Year’s Eve! As we did with Christmas we here at MegaComicsGroup.com want to wish each and every reader of this blog and our comics a great New Year in 2011!

Mark got his First Prize Art! As you read in our last blog, Mark Poe won the Allen Bellman art shown here. He got it via UPS the other day and couldn’t be happier. Seen here with said masterpiece is our esteemed Publisher-In-Training and part time art collector. Soon the piece will take it’s place framed along side his signed Kerry Gammill Superman print and his Dave Simon’soriginal Power Girl art. Mark, being somewhat of a Golden Age of Comics Fan, is proud to have a little of his own Golden Age Memorabilia.

In case you missed it and, like us, are too lazy to scroll down to see it, 😉 here’s the recap from last week:

Thanks to Michael D. Hamersky and Make It So Marketing, Mark won the Grand Prize on the Black Friday Comics event the day after Thanksgiving on Facebook. Mr. Bellman promised a “…a tight graphite pencil sketch, 9×12 of Cappy (Captain America), belting Hitler, or any other villain of that period. I will put all but the kitchen sink into it. This one could have a value of $195.” True to his word, he delivered at Mark’s request of “Cap punching out the Red Skull with Hitler in the background.” Click the image to the right for a larger viewing in a new window.

Find out all about Mr. Bellman and his commission sketches on his web site: www.AllenBellman.com, where you can contact him.

Archives Spotlight

We continue our look back at our previously posted web comics. We’ll be looking at all that’s come before with this feature and adding new comments as well. This month we are reviewing Project: New Man #2 and Humants #1! Stay tuned to this section everyFriday for more of our archived titles.

Project: New Man #2 – Page 16 – Ah! Now we are starting to learn something! Do you recall a post a few days ago on the main MCG blog regarding a group called Razor’s Edge? See how this all ties into our previous work in Small Press for Magi Graphics?

“E.D.G.E. stands for Excecutive Division of Genetic Engineering. I trust the implications speak for themselves.”

Mark’s Remarks:I like this page better…although I think I over did the size of the panels here a little. The story telling would have been better suited to have 4 or 5 panels on this page. My own inking started to take over more here as well, giving a little more continuity in the art from page to page.

Humants #1 – Page 15 – Now that the hero introductions are out of the way it’s time to prep for the introduction of our chief villain. Watch as Freazie pulls off some nice storytelling here and leads us through the origin of our baddie.

Mark’s Remarks: We had the name first! A few years ago one of the big two comics companies, Marvel I think it was, swiped our chief villain’s name: Mageddon for use on a totally different villain in one of their big crossover events. I’ve always heard if your stuff is worth stealing, that’s a big compliment… No, wait… it’s “imitation is the sincerest form of flattery”… or something like that. So I guess we’re flattered.. yeah, anyway… just so you know, we had that name first!

It was the same with the name New Man. We used it first then one of the guys at Image Comics used it for his own character. So this happened more than once. Coincidence? Maybe… Of course in comic books, names have been used for characters, especially villains, by more than one company over the years. It use to be fairly common. For instance Marvel and DC had villains called The Thinker. But these days, lawsuits, and more so, threats of lawsuits over copyright infringement are easy to come by. You will notice on book covers now the small TM (trademark) by just about every name used. It should be noted here, the one threatening a lawsuit has to have the money to pay the lawyers to back it up, which, naturally is no problem for the big two. It’s been an interesting observation of mine, that usually it’s the small companies, who don’t have the money to defend themselves in court, the big guys usually threaten with “cease and desist” letters. They seem to be far more tolerant of each other with such characters as Captain Marvel, for instance. I’m just saying… 😉

Green Lantern Illuminates the Big Screen!

Coming to a theater near you!DC’s Green Lantern movie will debut in the Spring of 2011! It marks the first time the Silver Age character has been on the movie screen in a live action performance. Marvel’s recent success with Iron Man, the X-Men, the Fantastic Four and of course Spider-Man has finally prompted DC Comics and parent company Warner Brothers to extend their Super Hero movie offerings beyond Batman and Superman. We’ve purloined a few still shots and promo pieces here for your viewing pleasure.

SideNote: We’re not sure, in all cases, just what pieces DC has actually released and what fan’s have created. The technology which fans have access to these days makes it hard to tell. These pieces can be found all over the internet. A couple of fan generated YouTube vids we watched looked as good, and some said even better, than what Warner Brothers put out! Of course if you want the actual official Warner Brothers trailer just go the websitewww.greenlanternmovie.warnerbros.com. Some of it looks promising, while some of it we’re not so sure about.

The Official Press Release:

In a universe as vast as it is mysterious, a small but powerful force has existed for centuries. Protectors of peace and justice, they are called the Green Lantern Corps. A brotherhood of warriors sworn to keep intergalactic order, each Green Lantern wears a ring that grants him superpowers. But when a new enemy called Parallax threatens to destroy the balance of power in the Universe, their fate and the fate of Earth lie in the hands of their newest recruit, the first human ever selected: Hal Jordan.

Hal is a gifted and cocky test pilot, but the Green Lanterns have little respect for humans, who have never harnessed the infinite powers of the ring before. But Hal is clearly the missing piece to the puzzle, and along with his determination and willpower, he has one thing no member of the Corps has ever had: humanity. With the encouragement of fellow pilot and childhood sweetheart Carol Ferris (Blake Lively), if Hal can quickly master his new powers and find the courage to overcome his fears, he may prove to be not only the key to defeating Parallax…he will become the greatest Green Lantern of all.

Mark Poe, our esteemed Publisher -In-Training and oft times movie critique weighs in with his two cents worth…

Mark’s Remarks

WOW! The Green Lantern was always one of my favorite characters from the ’60’s and ’70’s.

This, of course, was the second Green Lantern comic book readers were treated to. The Golden Age Green Lantern was very different.

The first GL had a magic ring with which he did his amazing, heroic feats. The second GL had the same shtick with the ring but, as with most things in the’60’s, the rings workings was explained by science or to be more accurate, science fiction. This new Green Lantern did not operate alone either, he was backed up by an entire Green Lantern Corps! This was a really cool idea! GL was like an interstellar police officer! Nothing like this, to my knowledge, had been done in super hero comics. It made for a great springboard for storytelling!

During the Silver Age of Comics GL’s creators John Broome and Gil Kane adapted what Bill Finger and Martin Nodell, had created in the Golden Age. DC creators had used this same formula to revitalize their other flagging characters starting with the Flash, and later on old stand-by’s like Hawkman, and the Atom. They also revitalized the old Justice Society of America to a more modern, for the time, Justice League of America. Editor Julius Schwartz resided over these titles and had a hand in directing the revival of the super hero genre for DC much the way Stan Lee did with Marvel. While Stan and Jack built the Marvel Universe, Julius and company re-built the DC Universe.

Sales were good for most of the ’60’s until a drop off occurred after ’68 which incidentally happened about the same time the live action Batman show was canceled which had brought a mini-boom for all super hero comics while it was on the air. Young talents Denny O’neil and Neal Adams were brought on board the Green Lantern book and turned loose to do very much anything they wanted. New interest was created in the aging title as a hipper, more relevant Green Arrow was teamed up with Green Lantern and stories which were more appealing to the readers of the Woodstock era. Even so the title was eventually canceled, a causality of a changing of the guard in the audience as the Silver Age and Marvel Age drew to a close.

Then came the revivals… Green Lantern enjoyed a one toward the end of the ’70’s as the Green Lantern/Green Arrow team was revived this time by Denny O’neil and Mike Grell. I enjoyed this series even though it was not as relevant as the O’neil/Adams collaboration or as innovative as the Broome/Kane issues. I was not real thrilled with GL’s treatment in the ’90’s and I was not alone in that sentiment. Hal Jordan became the bad guy Parallax and was replaced by Guy Gardner, Jon Stewart and finally Kyle Rayner. I really don’t know what they are doing with him these days in the comic books. Yes, I admit I don’t keep up with the mainstream comics too well these days, I prefer the indys. But I do like to pick up the trade paperbacks, collections and graphic novels form the mainstream publishers.

I certainly hope Green Lantern is a good film and will generate interest in bringing other DC characters to the big screen. There are tentative plans for sequels if this one is successful. I would really like to see that. It would be a treat, if done right, to see a movie of the entire Justice League! It could happen! 🙂

Archives Spotlight

We continue our look back at our previously posted web comics. We’ll be looking at all that’s come before with this feature and adding new comments as well. This month we are reviewing Project: New Man #2 and Humants #1! Stay tuned to this section everyFriday for more of our archived titles.

Project: New Man #2 – Page 17 – So David “Killer” Kane will take on a new identity as Dave Davison in “Witness Protection” type fashion. He’s sentenced to death, so life even as a genetic Guinea Pig doesn’t sound so bad, besides if things did not go as planned he could always escape. Although conflicted about his own motives he is still very confident in his covert ops training.

Mark’s Remarks:This page has a better flow to it I think… and a little better mix of perspective in an attempt to make “talking heads” a little more interesting.

Humants #1 – Page 16 – Shhh..now listen carefully, reader. Much is to be learned from this conversation between Devlin Delano and his chief lackey, Gregory Lawthers.

Mark’s Remarks: Here’s Freazie White, Jr.’s version of “talking heads.” In scripting this first issue of the Humants Freazie made good use of the conversation between the industrialist Devlin Delano and his chief gofer Gregory Lawthers to give us some vital exposition to the story. But fear not Action Attics! Freazie will be bringing all you can stand in in just another page or two! Plus we’ll get to see the origin of the Humants main bad guy… Mageddon!

Green Hornet Buzzes the Big Screen!

Wallpaper image courtesy of entertainmentwallpaper.com.

America and the World must be fascinated by Super Heroes! Why else would Hollywood keep putting out film after film featuring the super heroes previously relegated to comic books? Last week we talked about the new movie of DC Comics’s Green Lantern which will debut this Spring! So here we are again with yet another Green hero. This one, The Green Hornet dates back to BEFORE the Golden Age of Comics! But so as not to steal our esteemed Publisher-In-Training and resident green bee keeper’s thunder, let’s turn it over to Mr. Mark Poe right now. 🙂

Mark’s Remarks

A Green Hornet TV promo poster.

The Green Hornet is actually one of the oldest comic book hero characters around. He rivals the Shadow and Doc Savage in age and appeared 3 years before the first issue of Action Comics featuring Superman. Originally he debuted as a pulp hero and masked vigilante on radio! George W. Trendle created the character with advice from Fran Striker along with radio director James Jewell in 1936 . Since then, the Green Hornet has appeared in several drama series in various media outlets. There were film serials in the 1940s, a national television program in the 1960s, many comic book series from the 1940s until now and a major motion picture this month. The characters have been revamped many times over the years but for the most part remained faithful to the original concepts.

TV’s Green Hornet & Kato: Van Williams & Bruce Lee

My first memory of Green Hornet was the 1967-68 television show which followed the Batman show on the ABC network. The success of the Batman series inspired Greenway Productions to adapt the old radio and movie-serial masked crime fighter for the ABC network in similar fashion in which they did the Batman series. The show starred Van Williams as the Green Hornet and the young martial artist Bruce Lee as his sidekick Kato. Instead of the campy approach they used for the Batman series, The Green Hornet was played in a more serious tone. The Greenway style of filming, music, use of gadgets and drama was still there but not treated as a parody of super heroes. Unfortunately, it was canceled after one season. Bruce Lee went on to become a major star of martial arts movies. Bruce Lee‘s popularity in Hong Kong, where he grew up, was so great that the Green Hornet show was marketed there as The Kato Show.

TV’s Kato: The Late, Great Bruce Lee

The TV Green Hornet followed the adventures of man-about-town and newspaper publisher Britt Reid, who was secretly the masked hero the Green Hornet. The Green Hornet fought crime with help of his martial-artist sidekick Kato and his weapons-tricked-out car, the Black Beauty. The series began September 9, 1966, lasting 26 episodes through July 14, 1967 . Although the TV show was not campy it was over dramatized in a few places.

Even though I have not seen it, the movie looks promising. Some of the previews I’ve seen make me wonder if the movie makers did what the TV show producers did not, that is, turn the serious characters into campy parodies of themselves. I certainly hope that is not the case. I don’t think the viewing public would buy that and certainly the age old characters deserve better treatment. The characters and concept have the potential for a great hybrid super-hero/spy thriller storyline. Hopefully the movie producers realized that fact from the treatments and reception of the major super hero film offerings of the past few years.

As an added treat for today’s blog we’ve linked to a couple edited down versions of the first 2 episodes of the TV show way back from the 1960’s. Find out all about the new Green Hornet Movie from the website: www.greenhornetmovie.com. Enjoy!

Any questions or comments? All are welcome.

______________________________

Archives Spotlight

We continue our look back at our previously posted web comics. We’ll be looking at all that’s come before with this feature and adding new comments as well. This month we are reviewing Project: New Man #2 and Humants #1! Stay tuned to this section everyFriday for more of our archived titles.

Project: New Man #2 – Page 18 – Now we meet a guy who ends of being a prominent character in our little series. We love the exchange between Max and Dave in the last panel! 😀 Freazie can come up with some stuff! He da man! 😉

Mark’s Remarks:Now, with this page we begin to see a shift in the art. This page marks where I take over full pencils and inks. That’s a good thing with these layouts, which were mine to begin with, because I needed to correct a lot of my own mistakes. Of course, even with that I made a few more! ARRGHH! 😉

Humants #1 – Page 17 – When we first posted this… We were too shook up over a boneheaded numbering mistake over in Project: New Man # 2 to make any comments on this story! We left out one of the pages and it was like 5 days before we discovered the error. Than we had to go back and fix it. Geeze! Can you believe we did that? ACK! 🙁

Mark’s Remarks: First look at our series bad guy! Well, actually it’s just his helmet and cloak we see, but he shows up for real on the next page! The guys name is Mageddon! And trust me, he’s no gentleman.

The Mighty Thor In A Theater Near You!

Chris Hemsworth as Thor Wallpaper courtesy of comicbookmovie.com.

The Thor movie poster.

We’re on a roll here! A film roll that is! 😉 The last two weeks we’ve talked about the new movies of Green Lantern and GreenHornet. So since we have nothing better to talk about at this point and the subject is interesting to some of us, we’ll continue with the theme! Albeit, this time around we’ll not be going with the Green motif for obvious reasons. Today we’ll share what we know of the forthcoming Thor movie. What we know could fit in a match box, but that’s never stopped us from spouting off before! So why change now, eh? 😉

By now you know the drill. So here we turn it over to Mark Poe, our esteemed Publisher-In-Training and part time Myth Manager.

Take Note: If you like the awesome wall paper above, get more for your computer desktop at: www.comicbookmovie.com .

Mark’s Remarks

The Hammer of Thor Promo Poster.

The stuff of legends… literally!Chris Hemsworth portrays the mighty but arrogant god warrior whose careless actions re-start an ages old war. Thor is kicked out of the heavenly gates of Asgard by his father Odin played by… gulp… Anthony Hopkins? Forced to live and move among the lowly mortals of Earth he meets a beautiful young scientist, Jane Foster portrayed by Natalie Portman. She, of course, as the old Stan Lee/Jack Kirby story goes, becomes his first love. Here, as is the usual case with a classic love story, is where Thor grows up. He soon learns what it takes to be a true hero when the Asgard’s most dangerous villain sends dark forces to invade Midgard (Earth).

So far so good. Except for casting one of the biggest movie villains ever, Anthony Hopkins, as Odin, it sounds as if we have the making of another great film from Marvel. The sets and costumes look convincing, even if not exactly as Kirby drew it. The hammer is perfect, which will go a long way. Mjolnir of course is no mere movie prop, and it will be interesting to see how they use the Hammer of Thor in the flick. A lot of the props and costumes reflect the work of Walter Simonson from his run on Thor in the ’80’s as well as that of Lee and Kirby from the ’60’s. That’s a nice tribute to Walt who probably did more with the characters than anyone else since Stan and Jack created them.

Anthony Hopkins as Odin.

So why isn’t Hopkins playing Loki, Thor’s evil half brother? Good question. Age, I suppose has a lot to do with it. But to his credit Hopkins seems to do well for the part in the little bit which can be seen in the movie trailer. Still, in my mind at least, Odin should be played by someone a bit heavier, more imposing figure with a deeper voice. Someone like Orson Wells, if he were still alive, would be perfect, but maybe that’s just me.

Chris Hemsworthseems to fit the Thor role to a “T”. This Thor again is more like the character Walter Simonson revamped than does the original Lee/Kirby creation. Donald Blake seems to be no where in sight on the trailer. Maybe the producers thought the timid, Clark Kent type was not right for the movie, but it seems to me to be an interracial part of the story of Thor’s humbling. For Odin to have forced his arrogant son to spend time in a weak, crippled body as Blake was portrayed in the comics seems to be the perfect path for the story in my estimation.

Natalie Portman, of Star Wars: Episode 1 fame, is a great pick for the Jane Foster role. But she seems to be a stronger personality than Lee and Kirby’s Jane. Of course the world is a lot different place now than it was in the ’60’s. Watching the trailer we noticed another female role in the film. Could that be Sif, Thor’s warrior maiden girlfriend? Hmmm…

Out of the 3 films I have reported on, this movie looks the most promising. I still have not seen Green Hornet, but some of my friends on Facebook were less than impressed with it. So much so I may wait until it’s released on DVD this summer to watch it.

Something to watch for: The website comicbookmovie.com has reported the movie trailers for both Thor and Captain America are to be two of this year’s Super Bowl commercials.

Again this week as an added treat we’ve linked the Thor Movie trailer to this site for everyone to see.: www.greenhornetmovie.com. Enjoy!

Any questions or comments? All are welcome.

______________________________

Archives Spotlight

We continue our look back at our previously posted web comics. We’ll be looking at all that’s come before with this feature and adding new comments as well. This month we are reviewing Project: New Man #2 and Humants #1! Stay tuned to this section everyFriday for more of our archived titles.

Mark’s Remarks: Ah! Listen to the dialog here.Freazie White, Jr. Creator and editor of Humants as well as Project: New Man’s csripter extraordinare, masterfully used the conversation between Max & Dave to reveal a lot about the Rockwell Prison Holding Facility. Using this device subtly explains why a guy on death row would be in the same joint with someone serving a sentence for a minor offense.

Humants #1 – Page 18 – Yow! Is that guy going into convulsions?! Whoa! What’s with his eyes?! Gulp! He’s being levitated and it seems he is being absorbed by that dark figure. Uh oh…

Truth, Justice and the Captain America Way!

Cap’s Entertainment Weekly Cover

Cap’s original shield.

Next up on our look at upcoming super hero movies is Captain America! So far we don’t know a whole lot about this one. It’s suppose to be out in July of this year, but other than a few still photos and the basic premise Marvel seems to be keeping a tight lid on this project. This isn’t the first time they have tried to do a movie about the star spangled World War 2 legend and the previous attempts were met with less than enthusiastic reviews.

As with out previous previews, we will turn this over to Mark Poe, our esteemed Publisher-In-Training and part time Historian.

Like the photos? There are plenty more cool looking wallpaper for your computer desktop images like you see here from: www.comicbookmovie.com .

Mark’s Remarks

A glimpse of the government project which turns Steve Rogers into a Living Legend.

The Living Legend of World War 2!Stan Lee used that phrase over and over to describe Captain America during the 1960’s Marvel Age of Comics. Along with Jack Kirby and the Marvel Bullpen of artists and inkers, Stan turned a Golden Age character who, after the World War, was all but forgotten into, a household name. Of course, turning obscure characters into cultural icons was what Stan and Jack were all about in those days! They brought a company that didn’t even really have a name, which published movie and TV knock-offs to become the top selling comic book publisher by the end of the decade. This was accomplished in large part due to the marketing savoir faire of both Stan Lee and then Publisher Martin Goodman who never missed an opportunity to merchandise the Marvel Characters. Whether the opportunity was stationary, t-shirts, model kits or the animated series which ran on TV. Stan did not miss a trick. There was movie proposals as well but none ever panned out in the ’60’s.

Then came the ’70’s and Marvel’s first live action attempts. Captain America appeared first in a 1979 made for TV movie on CBS: Captain America, which aired January 19, 1979. Later that same year Captain America II: Death Too Soon debuted November 23, 1979, both starring Reb Brown as Cap. Other than the character names these films resembled the Marvel Comics characters very little. Although not bad movies these still fell short of fan expectations. Neither did the changes made in the characters and story relate better to the TV viewers of the time who had never read the comic books.

Captain America: The First Avenger 2011

There was also a 1990 film titled Captain America, starring Matt Salinger. This movie was shot in Yugoslavia. It was fairly faithful to the Marvel Comics version depicting the origin of Captain America from the 4-F (rejected) volunteer soldier Steve Rogers. The movie showed his World War 2 missions and his apparent death at the end of the war. Then he is found decades later frozen in ice, and being awakened from suspended animation, he must deal with being a man out of his time like a modern Rip Van Winkle. The Red Skull is in this one too, but for some reason they made him an Italian fascist rather than a German Nazi. Weird. This film itself was never released in theaters in the US, but it was released on VHS in 1992. I saw the previous two movies but I never saw this one. From everyone I’ve talked to or read after who has seen it I’ve not found any positive reaction to it. Apparently after doing a few test screenings, Marvel decided it was not good enough to release to theaters.

It is worth mentioning the ’40’s serial film about Captain America. I never saw this either but I’ve read the plots, which are very loosely based on the Marvel Cap and I’ve seen still images from the film. From what I’ve seen it doesn’t look like a winner.

That brings us back around to the 2011 Movie.

“In 1942, Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) is deemed too physically unfit to enlist in the U.S. Army and fight the Nazis in World War 2. Volunteering instead for Project: Rebirth, a secret military operation, he is physically transformed into a super-soldier dubbed Captain America. With sidekick Bucky Barnes, he fights the Red Skull (Hugo Weaving), Hitler’s treacherous head of advanced weaponry, whose own plan for world domination involves a seemingly magical object known as the Tesseract.“

I have high hopes from the photos I’ve seen. If you notice the uniform Cap wears for this film, you can see the producer is trying to use a more realistic approach and play down the spandex. The uniform is based off airmen’s jackets from the World War 2 era and the gloves and boots from some of the GI gear. There is said to be an effort in the script and direction of the story for Steve Rogers to laugh at the costume they want him to wear to USO rallies, which is the comic book version of the Captain America costume. Instead of settling for ridicule of wearing the “Patriotic Pajamas” Steve get’s in contact with Howard Stark, Tony (Iron Man) Stark’s dad, and has him design and make a more battle sensible uniform. This should add a bit of realism to the super hero myth, since most real people would never wear the traditional super hero tights.

Reminder: The folks at comicbookmovie.com has reported official movie trailers for both the Thor and Captain America movie trailers are to aired during this year’s Super Bowl .

Even though there is no official Captain America trailer out YET, regardless of what folks posting to YouTube tell you, there are plenty of fan created teasers. Some are very good, like the following:

Any questions or comments? All are welcome.

______________________________

Archives Spotlight

We continue our look back at our previously posted web comics. We’ll be looking at all that’s come before with this feature and adding new comments as well. This month we are reviewing Project: New Man #2 and Humants #1! Stay tuned to this section everyFriday for more of our archived titles.

Mark’s Remarks: Once again Freazie White, Jr. Creator, artist and editor of the Humants title as well as Project: New Man’s scripter, turns in some great work! Very nice, natural, dialog between these two characters.

I was also pleased with the art here, which is now 100% my pencils and inks. Look closely and you will see my artistic influences. There are hints of Jack Kirby, John Byrne, Terry Austin and Joe Sinnott on this page. Still I had room for improvement, as is always the case.

Humants #1 – Page 19– Mageddon, the Spoiler of Dimensional Integrity! The Dark Lord of the Hecati! Not a guy you want to hang around for sure. Lawthers better find a fast exit while he can!

Mark’s Remarks: No, not a good day for Gregory Lawthers at all! The origin of Mageddon continues! Freazie and Al turned in another great page here! With just a little inking assist as well as half tone shading from yours truly. 😉

The Living Legend of World War 2!

Cap in full uniform.

Don’t miss Super Bowl XLV this Sunday on the Fox Network! It has been announced the official movie trailers for both movies featuring Thor and Captain America will be aired during this weekend’s Super Bowl. Of course the match up of The Pittsburgh Steelers and the Green Bay Packers might be worth watching too. 😉

We have some new photos and info for the Captain America movie! More and more is coming out about the new movie which is officially titled: Captain America: The First Avenger. The title itself is revealing to sharp eyed Marvel Comics fans! As we understand it, this is to be the first of 3 movies which lead to the climatic introduction of the Avengers movie.

In the latest issue of Empire Magazine there’s a lot of new images from the movie. Check out the cover here on your right. Photos in the magazine include Chris Evans as Captain America, Hayley Atwell as Cap’s girlfriend Peggy Carter, Tommy Lee Jones starring as Col. Chester Phillips and many more.

We are not sure if this is the Official teaser copy, but this seems to be slightly edited versions floating around the web at various places. Regardless of the source it a good read!

Born during the Great Depression,Steve Rogers grew up a frail youth in a poor family. Horrified by the newsreel footage of the Nazis in Europe, Rogers was inspired to enlist in the army. However, because of his frailty and sickness, he was rejected. Overhearing the boy’s earnest plea, General Chester Phillips offered Rogers the opportunity to take part in a special experiment…Operation: Rebirth.

After weeks of tests, Rogers was at last administered the Super-Solider Serum and bombarded by ‘vita-rays.’ Steve Rogers emerged from the treatment with a body as perfect as a body can be and still be human. Rogers was then put through an intensive physical and tactical training program. Three months later, he was given his first assignment as Captain America. Armed with his indestructible shield and battle savvy, Captain America wages war against evil.

Cap Movie Tie-In Comic

There will be an eight issue limited comic book series tie-in. Cover artist Paolo Rivera, known for his work on Spider-Man, revealed his latest work for Marvel’s new digital comic book series for the anticipated movie. The eight-part series is titled Captain America: First Vengeance. Written by Fred Van Lente with a rotation of artists doing a story set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Each issue showcases a specific character from the movie, both heroes and villains. The stories act as a back story prelude for the movie. A pre-production copy of the cover can be seen here.

The Marvel Cinematic Universe is a shared fictional universe, much like the Marvel Universe in the comic books. Developed by Marvel Studios for the superhero films based on the Marvel Comics characters, it features shared plot elements in the films, settings, and characters much the same way Marvel Comics have been done since their beginnings. Contrary to what you might think, only three films set in the Marvel Cinematic Universe have been released. These were Iron Man, the 2008 version of The Incredible Hulk , and Iron Man 2 in 2010. The Spider-man, Fantastic Four, X-Men and first Hulk movies are not a part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. This is actually a rebooting of the Marvel Movies going forth. Four additional planned films are in the works which include Thor and Captain America: The First Avenger. The Avengers is in pre-production and Iron Man 3 is still in early development. Reboots of Spider-man, Fantastic Four, and X-Men are also in the works.There is also talk of films featuring S.H.I.E.L.D., Ant-Man, Black Panther, Ka-zar, the Punisher, Cable, Iron Fist, Nighthawk, the Vision, the Black Widow, Dr. Strange, Luke Cage, Dazzler, War Machine and Power Pack.

Cap and sidekick Bucky Barnes in World War 2.

So Captain America: The First Avenger is just 1 part of a much larger whole. Long time comics fans will recall Bucky Barnes was Cap’s sidekick back in WW2. In the new movie Bucky has not been forgotten, although he might not be recognizable to some fans. Actor Sebastian Stan is to portray a “dark” Bucky Barnes in the film. Not many details are available concerning the movie version of Bucky that we’ve been able to find so far. A photo showing Cap and Bucky together can be seen here.

Some Captain America movie concept art.

Now here’s the lowdown on the cast courtesy of Wikipedia:

In December 2009, director Joe Johnston indicated he planned to start filming in April 2010. In a separate interview that month, he described the film’s pre-production: “Rick Heinrichs is production-designing and we’re set up down in Manhattan Beach, California. We have eight or ten really talented artists, and we all just sit around all day and draw pictures and say, ‘Hey, wouldn’t it be cool if we could do this?’ It’s that phase of the production where money doesn’t matter: ‘Let’s put all the greatest stuff up on the wall and then later see what we can afford.’ ” The film,” he said, will begin “in 1942, 1943” during World War II. “The stuff in the ’60s and ’70s comic books we’re sort of avoiding. We’re going back to the ’40s, and then forward to what they’re doing with Captain America now.” Johnston confirmed that the Red Skull would be the film’s primary antagonist. In February 2010, he stated that the World War II-era super team the Invaders will appear in “the entire second half” of the film, though in November he shot down speculation that the Sub-Mariner, an Invaders team-member in the comics, would be included.

Variety reported in March 2010, that Chris Evans was cast as Captain America, and Hugo Weaving as the Red Skull.

In April, Sebastian Stan, who had been mentioned in media accounts as a possibility to play the title role of Captain America, was cast as Bucky Barnes. Stan is contracted for multiple films. Also in April it was announced that Hayley Atwell had been cast as Captain America’s girlfriend Peggy Carter as well as the changing of the film’s name from The First Avenger: Captain America to Captain America: The First Avenger. The next day it was reported that Joss Whedon would be re-writing the script for Joe Johnston’sCaptain America: The First Avenger as part of his negotiation to write and direct The Avengers. However the extent of Whedon’s polish on Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely’s script remained unknown. Whedon later clarified in an August interview that “I just got to make some character connections. The structure of the thing was really tight and I loved it, but there were a couple of opportunities to find his voice a little bit — and some of the other characters — and make the connections so that you understood exactly why he wanted to be who he wanted to be. And progressing through the script to flesh it out a little bit”. Samuel L. Jackson revealed in an interview that he will reprise his role as Nick Fury in the film. Kevin Fiege later confirmed that Fury’s elite special unit of US Army Rangers, the Howling Commandos would also appear.

In May, Marvel Studios confirmed Hugo Weaving will play the Red Skull. Toby Jones entered final negotiations to play Arnim Zola. Iron Man director Jon Favreau said a younger Howard Stark would appear in the film, played by Dominic Cooper. Tommy Lee Jones will have a role in the film. By June, Neal McDonough was in talks to play Dum Dum Dugan. Four days later, McDonough confirmed he was taking the part. On the same day, Stanley Tucci joined the cast as Dr. Abraham Erskine, the scientist who created the Super Soldier Serum.

A blast from the past! Take a look at these clips from YouTube. Originally aired on the Marvel Superheroes animated show way back in the ’60’s. This animated feature was made directly from the comic book art by Jack “King” Kirby.

Any questions or comments? All are welcome.

______________________________

Archives Spotlight

We continue our look back at our previously posted web comics. We’ll be looking at all that’s come before with this feature and adding new comments as well. This month we are reviewing Project: New Man #2 and Humants #1! Stay tuned to this section everyFriday for more of our archived titles.

Project: New Man #2 – Page 21 – Don’t worry. This isn’t a Christain Pamplet and we’re not trying to convert you! One thing we like to depict in our stories is diverse characters. Hey! That’s reality. We all know people like these, right? So we have some characters who are Christian, some who are not religious at all, some who are Atheist or Agnostic. You really never know what kind of character will show up in our tales just like you never know what kind of folks you will meet in real life. But isn’t that the spice of life? Wouldn’t things be boring without it?

Okay so now let’s get our focus back on the story here. Dave is a little surprised at how close Max’s comparisons match up with his conversation with the Warden. It makes an impression on the guy. One that will have some bearing later on in the story.

Mark’s Remarks:As the story unfolds you may notice some similarities in New Man’s origin to that of a certain red, white, and blue Avenger! That’s because Captain America’s origin tale was a great inspiration for our hero.

Humants #1 – Page 20– Now here is a nicely done page. One of Freazie White, Jr.’s best and that’s saying some! Actually Freazie got even better with his pencils and storytelling as we progressed in the series. Just wait until you see issue 2!

Billy Leavell, our ace letterer, came up with the spooky way of doing Megaddon’s word balloons. It really adds to the mood of the scene, eh?

Now we have introduced the team and the villians, time for some action… on the next page!

Mark’s Remarks: Now, I like this page! I thought Freazie did a great job penciling this one as did Al inking it. I added some tones to give it an even more serious feel!